Happiness Is A Warm Gun
by AlinaLotus
Summary: Oh, didn't you hear? She died- yes, her father's gun, of course. She couldn't stand it, you see. Couldn't stand being alone.


**This doesn't really have a specific time frame, and is AU. Warnings are implied fslash, character death, suicide and slight language. Um...shit, read if you dare.**

And you think it's all a lie. Or maybe you just hope that, or it's what you tell yourself, or maybe it's what they tell you with their too-tight smiles and gaudy eyes, staring through you like it's all okay, really, _it's okay, Bella_.

They never say the words, because they're trying to be kind, cover their own pain so it doesn't add to yours, but they don't realize that you don't give a fuck about their pain. You don't give a fuck about anything.

"Bella it just...it happens and things like that can't be changed." It's what Charlie says, because he doesn't know everything, doesn't know anything. He doesn't know the truth, the truth was forbidden and that makes it easier (while making it harder) to face.

Charlie doesn't know that Alice Cullen was murdered.

**oooo**

Sleepless days turn into sleepless nights, but Edward doesn't let it happen like that. It's like a CD skipping or a scratch on a DVD during a vital scene in the movie, the pivotal moment in the chorus where every word of the song comes together, when the heroine of the film is triumphant and overcomes the demons of her past.

But you never were a heroine and your stereo is shoved in the back of your closet, away and forgotten (the CD with her writing on it is dusty and untouched).

The tranquilizer knocks you out for two days, and when you awake you're groggy and rested and thirsty, and _drip drip drip_ is the IV attached to your wrist.

Your eyes burn with hate as you focus in, Edward sitting in the chair beside the sofa, leafing through a music book.

"We weren't going to let you kill yourself." He says, but he doesn't apologize for kidnapping you and drugging you. You know he's not sorry, and you wonder if things were different, if maybe you had loved him instead, if you would be okay. If you'd be over it like the rest of them seem to be.

_Kill yourself_ he said, but you weren't trying to, you wouldn't, you didn't...

**oooo**

It wasn't easy to escape them, but you did it. Thankfully Charlie isn't the wiser to what was going on, to what you're going to do. Fishing trips with Billy Black are the answer for Charlie, and he trusts you.

What a sad mistake, because Alice trusted you too and now she's gone and dead and never coming back.

Edward called five minutes ago, and you convinced him you were okay, just cleaning the house, preparing dinner for Charlie, the usual. He agreed that things sounded better, but he'd be by later, after he hunted, to check on you.

You tell him, you say "goodbye, Edward," and it's final in a way that is satisfying.

**oooo**

_I'm sorry,_ you start to write, _I'm sorry I wasn't stronger._

You don't believe that, because you think it takes nerves of steel to do it, to end it, that true courage is telling Nature or God or the Universe to fuck off, you're done, you're tapping out, but it's what they'll all want to hear, so you can give them that much, at least. There are many things you'd like to say to them, how you blame them for her dying, how you think they let her get killed, but you really just blame yourself and they would see through it anyway.

So you put the paper down, and you wish Charlie wouldn't have such a mess to clean up, but maybe the other cops will do that, or maybe the Cullens will do it, maybe Edward will find you before Charlie and make it easier on your father.

You hope so, but you don't really care.

**oooo**

"I just never thought," one of them whispers, "the daughter of the Chief, such good grades, a pretty thing too- "

"It happens to those you least expect, the quiet ones are always the- "

"Oh, didn't you hear? She died- yes, her father's gun, of course. She couldn't stand it, you see. Couldn't stand being alone." This one is whispering into a cell phone, all sorts of irreverence and disgrace and it's almost too much for him to take.

"They say the note wasn't long, just a few sentences maybe. I wonder what could make a child with everything ahead of them want to give it all up?"

"Her poor father, he found her, you know- "

"Edward." Esme pulls his arm, away from the crowd of church women in black, pulls him back to their family. He's blocked everything out, but he can still hear, can still hear the words and how he didn't get there in time and Bella dying is his fault.

"I will kill them for this," her son says, and Esme hates the glint in his eye and pretends that she doesn't see it, pretends she doesn't hear the maniacal lust in his voice.

Pretending seems to be a way of life now, and she wonders how long it will be before she loses another child to the merciless, sadistic governors of their world.

**The 'merciless, sadistic governors of their world' is the Volturi. Alice was murdered by the Volturi for refusing to join them. *shrug* sorry I didn't work that in more.**

**Anyway, as always, feedback is love. **


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